Bloodshed and Ruined Kohl
by Epiphany Under Moonlight
Summary: Some thought the horror only started in the future when the game was played and the trick spilled blood. But it started much earlier than that. In the days when he was simply a child and they were nothing more than clinging lovers, the madness still ruled


This is a gift fic for Cecelia, who is very loyal, supportive, encouraging as well as inspiring. God bless ya girl. I hope everybody likes.

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The sound of slamming and scraping filled the expanse of one wing of the palace. Below and above, and off to either side of the hallway the servants worked tirelessly despite the swarming darkness of the night. Brows furrowed and dashed with sweat, hands calloused and warm. Despite the violent clashing that had the stones rumbling in consternation the women and men pretended it was silent still, a peaceful moment. Those that were bold, whispered at the noise but the wiser, more fearful ones were silent and determined. There was nothing to be said, as far as they ignorantly knew nothing was the matter. 

After all, only a fool would point out the failing of a God.

Because Gods did not fail.

They blessed and damned and did not abide by human laws.

And so no one disturbed him.

The shadows slithered along the walls and past the feet of servants, causing them to shudder, the shadows hid his secrets.

Not so far away, the shadows contended with the newest offspring to come unto their power.

The youngest prince of the kingdom stayed in a room that had been his nursery and now sufficed as his bedroom and playroom, the large expanse brimming with toys and decorations and gifts he had been given.

It was meant to be a happy place, bright and safe and warm. But in this night the child of the pharaoh, the golden star of the sun god, was not happy.

He'd been left alone when he had wanted to play and be with his parents, he'd been abandoned when he wanted company….it was not fair. Soft petals lips folded over his thumb and he sighed deeply.

He had wanted to play and have fun but something had gone wrong, he couldn't figure out what it was but he'd been picked up and taken to his room so swiftly.

His Father's warm, strong hands around his waist as he carried him haphazardly down the hall, giggling because he bounced, his fingers nearly touching the floor a few times as he was moved up and down.

When they came to his room his favorite toy had been thrust quickly into his hands and he had wondered.

What game?

"Hide...seek?", he had asked, still not knowing, as he held the toy tightly and stared up at his Father smiling.

But then he had caught sight of his Father's eyes.

Vicious red permeated completely through with black.

Not happy.

Not good.

Not...?

Mad, angry, sad, killing?

He didn't know.

Red eyes had glowed as he stared down at his child and shut the door, locking his son in the silence and sanctity they had made for him, and Yugi hugged the bear tight, his head lowering though his eyes stayed locked with his Fathers and when the door shut he felt...

Lonely, unsure, wrong, wrong, wrong, not good.

He had tried to open the door, his small hands near frantic, but found it leadened with magick.

His Daddy had used magick against him?

...no...

He had tried again and again but it changed nothing, nothing.

And so he sat.

His bear was close and soft, the warm smell of spices and jasmine still wafting from it, his Daddy's gift when he had laughed and traced golden fingertips over his cheek, his bed was large and overwhelmed with many pillows. Because it was too much, because it was excess, because Mommy understood.

They loved him...he knew...he thought he knew...he -

He sat in a darkness that cuddled and coddled him and wondered why he couldn't be with them now?

_Why?_

Didn't they love him anymore?

A soft sigh and he blinked, stunned, as for a pure moment the shadows seized and suffocated, blacking out everything.

He heard and saw nothing in this moment and his curiosity was peaked before it faded again.

He wondered what they didn't want him to know...and he held the bear tighter and sucked gently.

And what the shadows hid...

Golden hands closed over solid ivory wrists and she screamed.

Dozens winced at the feral sound and hurriedly buried themselves in their work again, their hands performing the mundane tasks their lives were devoted to with vigor.

She screamed again and pushed at him, sharp nails intended entirely for hurt.

She wasn't completely sure if she really wanted to hurt him but she was too far gone to care.

"Stop it!", he had commanded a thousand armies and yet never had dominion over his own wife.

"Let go!", she did not obey him, she was not one of his servants or followers, at times she was not even his wife.

"I begged you, I warned you!", he was holding her too tight, he knew it, he knew how easily bruises stained her skin but he was so angry.

"Let go!", she wished she could hurt him, she wished he was a little less tense, a little more trusting, a lot more foolish, then she could -

"What will you do! What will you do to make it not real? Run off into the desert, hungry and mad! We have a child!", the one word was fastly coming to be the bargaining point in many of their arguments. Their son.

"**Let go of me!**", louder, more animalistic, more desperate.

"I begged you to feed, I begged", a vicious whisper.

Gods did not beg.

Gods did not need.

Gods were not sorry, or scared, or worried, or...in love.

"I hate you. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you", demon whispers from a false angel.

And she did.

With all her heart and soul she did.

And if he made her cry she'd kill him.

Yugi didn't need a Father.

And she did not need a husband.

She tried to claw at his chest, at his neck, at his face, whatever she could reach...and he allowed it.

Blood seeped and pain feathered, lashes shut for a moment.

He didn't mind pain.

Pain was only the sharpest moment of being alive.

He would have rather the pleasure she could give him.

But her pain was just as precious.

And just as welcome...though he missed it...her smiles.

He stopped her after a moment, a cold stone in the face of her deadly anger and shuddering breath. Held her tiny frail wrist tight enough that it could break if she attempted anymore foolishness.

4 cuts.

Across his cheek, his neck, along his jaw, and close to his eye, the scratch resting above the bone.

Razor thin and not at all damaging.

She could have screamed in frustration and torn her hair out in fury.

Gods were forever untouched, even now, even by the likes of her.

He frowned deeply.

"Does your diplomacy and kindness beforehand make up for the moment when you tear out someone's neck?", cool and thoughtful and it hurt her.

The face of her latest victim flashed in her mind behind her eyes, remembering every disfigurement and atrocity she'd done to him in the terror of hunger, and her face was frozen, eyes so clear in the unsettling memory.

She looked down, her head slowly stiffening lowering.

...she hated...

"Does the animal in you not feel sorrow when it attacks only for the sake of spilling blood and spreading all the pain you feel."

She hissed at him.

Sharp teeth, beautiful broken eyes, pretty mouth, lover's tongue.

He felt her instability, the melancholy and terrible horror she faced each time she looked in a mirror, and despite all she'd done, how many times she'd hurt and disappointed him, he didn't want it anywhere near her.

His wife.

His beautiful, precious wife.

...and himself.

A monster married to a monster.

How lucky they were that the evil hid under their lying skins.

He wrapped an arm around her, one still keeping her wrist tight and kissed her forehead as her teeth clenched, fangs clamping over one another.

Double edged sword and even the handle was daggered.

"Will you run off to the desert screaming and clawing at yourself again, the blood of your victims and yourself staining your clothes...my wife? My Queen.", she was tiny beneath him.

Her anger was fading and she was ancient, even now though the Earth was still young.

She was so very ancient and tired and lost.

He held her tightly.

She was precious to him, she was everything to him.

Both arms wrapped around and her fight had evaporated as well as her will and strength.

He did not want that.

"I looked for you last time, though you hid and ran and...and they told me not to, I did anyway - our son was sad. You abandoned the both of us and now you'd do it again?", he held her at arms length and looked into her eyes.

She was still, her eyes lit with dead color.

"What do you say to me?", soft question.

"I hate you, I hate you so much.", passion fading, emotion bringing forward exactly what he had fallen for in the first moments.

He nodded.

He was not sad.

He did not need to be sad.

Things would be fine, everything would work itself out somehow.

He was sleeping with a thing.

He had wed a thing.

He was forever indebted and in lust with a thing.

And yet -

He pressed his hand softly to her cheek as tears down past it.

His wife was crying.

Ra.

"You'll teach him from his first moments, that it's wrong? That it's bad? That he should be punished, suffer?", his voice grew more unsettled and tears ran down faster as she remembered her own teaching. A million other children, innocent, God so innocent, they had just been born...wrong. Just been sent to this earth through the wrong creatures. No one's fault but...Murdered... Anger and disgust and horror and hatred, children were killed, women were tortured.

Everyone was buried.

Everyone was dead.

Witches, monsters, evil, vampires.

Must die. Must be killed. Must torture. Must suffer.

**God, She didn't want anyone touching her son!**

She sobbed loudly and he held tightly rocking back and forth, shushing her.

He didn't want to cause her pain, he didn't want her to be sad, how odd that she was beautiful even with tears in her eyes but he never wanted her sorrow at his hands.

She couldn't breath, it was impossible to breathe, and see...and...

He kissed her lips tightly, pressing his own down against hers.

She fought against it. against him, against everything he was.

She did not need love and affection

The damned rarely did.

But he wasn't going to let go of her so easily.

He kissed until she needed to breath, until her lungs cried for air and she nearly fainted, till her legs were weak and her nails dug into his skin as she held to keep herself up.

He kissed her remembering every burning night, every soft word, every lingering touch and every moment of building trust.

Every moment when she had smiled, and understood, and supported and been nothing more than herself. Simply herself.

They did not lose it all now because of one man with his eyes bulging and his throat torn out.

And the others...

Blood splattering everywhere and her hyperventilating in a jagged corner, well fed and half out of her mind, hair stringy and eyes fever bright. terrible deaths never knowing till she -

Ra she could be vicious.

He nuzzled her wet cheek and whispered his devotion.

He pulled away as her lashes fluttered and she stared at him through a hurt childwoman's eyes.

She needed somewhere for this insanity to go before it destroyed everything she'd ever prayed for.

He waited a moment before continuing.

"Even when we healed you, even when we cleaned you, even when we kept you still and unviolent it was terrible."

"Don't you remember?".

...and she does.

They must have drugged her, after he dragged her from the cave and onto his horse and rode back to the kingdom. She didn't know whether he threw the blanket over her to protect or to hide her from the prying eyes of the people.

She knew that the thief had looked at her fascinated before he left, and the sun had started to make her skin burn, so she'd crawled into the blissfully dark cave.

When he brought her back he had kept her in some nondescript guest room, and he'd asked for assistance never letting the healers enter as he removed her madness and mutilation.

She remembered.

She didn't know how long she'd been away, by then it was hard to remember things, hard to think, so easy to smile.

The drugs and whatever else they fed her to keep her placated worked so well.

Her hair had been washed and combed out so it hung in a curtain around her. Her body had been wrapped in a loose robe and her world had consisted of the tiniest span of thoughts.

She had been vividly, disgustingly happy.

One day the door had opened and a small spikey head had poked in, large violet eyes surveying and skipping over everything before they stopped on her,

And he froze.

_His mommy was here?_

But he'd look in this room before and she hadn't been there then?

A wide childish smile danced on his face as he pushed the door open even wider and scampered in, his tiny legs carrying him soundly.

She hadn't been here before but she was here now!

He ran in his breath high and giggling as he attempted to climb onto her bed with his teddy bear.

A silly act.

She watched the process, which he took quite seriously, vaguely amused and interested, and when he managed to make it to the top his bear dropped to the floor.

A soft disappointed sound and he reached over the edge to retrieve it.

...If he wasn't careful he'd fall and break his pretty neck.

She grabbed him by the back of his shirt as he began to slip, lowered him enough to grab the bear and then pulled him next to her.

He plopped down and she marveled.

He was a ball of flesh and hunger and innocence and...her son...?

When had she had a son?

He hugged the bear and stopped dropping it on the blanket without a second thought before he stood and climbed on top of her.

"Mommy.", he cooed and kissed her cheek.

She could only blink and smile.

He had pretty eyes, bright and shiny just like jewels. ...She wondered if she could make necklaces out of his eyes.

Bad thought.

His smile faltered and those small hands cupped her cheek.

"Mommy?", he asked and she smiled at him.

He was so nice, like a doll.

Yugi blinked once and then twice slowly, long lashes dancing like raven's wings, e peered at her thoughtfully and concerned.

It didn't feel right at all.

"Momma?", whispers from a tiny poisonous mouth.

So this was her son?

He was very pretty.

How funny how odd, she had birthed a living doll into this world.

"I can't feel you Momma", little mind at work, such a darling thing.

She pressed a shaking hand, they had been shaking for so long now she was no longer concerned with it, to his face and marveled at the smoothness of his skin.

She was a Mother...when had that happened?

She laughed and he looked at her through haunted eyes.

The door was pushed open and she smiled at her husband, so this was their child?

Of course!

She laughed again and Atemu watched as Yugi turned raining violets to him, crystalline tears running down his skin.

"Momma -", they had attempted to snatch her child away from her then.

It was...not a wise decision.

She hashed out and felt her world, her peace begin to crumble.

She did not know what servant she had hurt, it didn't matter, a shallow cut, not as deep as she should have given him for even thinking of taking her child away from her.

A sharp cry and she had gently, lethally wrapped her arms around Yugi keeping him close and tight.

The servant clutched his bleeding hand and backed away barely stifling his wails.

And Yugi was happy again.

He was so young.

He only knew it felt wrong when she had laughed a few minutes ago but now...

Spark, emotion, passion, alive.

Momma.

His fears were momentarily banished and he stood blinking down at her blanket as she glared at her husband and all his idiotic servants and priests.

"Don't touch him.".

It was the only warning she would give.

Nervous eyes and they turned to talk amongst themselves to figure out a way to remove the sacred child from her presence.

But they were not suicidal.

Her eyes were wild and Yugi did not seemed disturbed anymore. He pressed his head against her chest and blinked at them thoughtfully, his expression blank.

It was not his expression though that caught all her attention.

It was her husbands.

Yami's face was frozen in a mixture of many emotions she didn't want to recognize.

"Give him to them", it was an order.

She smiled at him, it was not a nice smile.

A dignified raise of an eyebrow and the tiniest breathe of anger.

"Leave", an order directed at the lower servants.

The ones who had no right to see, the ones that had no right to know.

Fellahin.

They shuffled out their heads low and only a flicker in her glance was admittance of them leaving. The higher ones who parted after that did it for the sake of their own minds.

They didn't want to see how a vampire was tamed.

The few who stayed had loyalty and sacrifice running throughout their very blood.

The child was not concerned, the slight faults and pains he sometimes felt were not enough, never enough to turn him from his parents.

He curled down onto her lap and pulled out the few figurines he took with him everywhere.

A soldier and his horse, a farmer, and a monster.

Worn and carved perfectly, dyed and fodder to his mind.

He ran them down her leg making the noises the people made.

The soldier fought, the horse carried, the farmer supported, the monster obeyed.

Kill, assist, protect, destroy.

He knew the game well.

She smiled down at him as he abandoned the tense situation, she didn't know when she had gotten him, but he was her son, hers.

No one took him away from her in this moment.

Now or ever.

She ran her fingers through his hair and looked up at him.

Her smile disappeared instantly.

"You were going to take him away from me.".

His lips pursed and his face twitched for a moment.

"Give him to her".

"_No_.", silken whisper.

A deep frown and he was so close the magick sparked and crackled.

"Your love for our son seems to come up only at the worse moments".

Calm and very very mad.

She smiled sweetly at him.

"Our son? Yes. Our son, not hers or anyone else's to take away from me!", serenity ending in a snarl.

"And if you ever -", eyes slitted and jet black, the blue lost somewhere.

"**Isis you will leave now!**", a roar and her voice was caught in her throat as well as her breath.

She nodded her head and walked as fast as she could out of the room, her feet traveling smoothly and suddenly over the stone floor.

She had just shut the door before it started.

When Atemu carried his sleeping son from the room his cheek was beginning to bruise, his eyes were dark and the kohl rimming them was smudged.

He spared the time to carry the child away and tuck him in saying goodnight and kissing his forehead, murmuring the same protective prayer he did every night as he hovered by the door.

As soon as he shut it he was marching back to the room he had just left moments ago with a wife that was gasping and angrily rubbing bruises muttering of his demise.

When he slammed open the door she was surprised at his speedy return and also exceptionally grateful.

Thank you, she thought and when they launched themselves at each other anything resulting in affection was the furthest thing from their minds.

When Atemu collapsed on top of his wife much later, affection was not the furthest thing from his mind. Nor was it from hers.

Bruised mouth and utterly worn out, the cloak of night and a thick silk blanket hiding their nudeness.

They were so close and yet despite it all they were still further away.

As Atemu toyed with the idea of another child and the effect it could have on her worsening hormones.

Their first child had destroyed whatever equilibrium she had within her, and though he knew she loved Yugi dearly he wondered if she hated him for what his little soul had done to her.

But he - he did so want another child, a girl this time perhaps.

He gently kissed the crook of her neck and pressed his hand down atop her womb, she unconsciously sucked in her stomach at the movement and he said another prayer silently in his mind...for the future.

For the next child.

Even if...even if it completely destroyed her, he would keep her safe, protect her forever.

Sacrifice every member of his kingdom for all three hungry loves.

His family mattered more than anything else on this earth.

And as she lay beneath him, him still within her, trapped and not seeking escape she also prayed for the future.

She prayed she could get rid of it, the hunger, the lust, the anger, the hatred, the foolishness.

She had so much more to lose now, so much more to crush her soul if it slipped through her fingers and shattered to many pieces on the ground?

Would she ever be able to reclaim the lost glory?

No, never.

A tear slipped past her eye, blood red and coursing through with emotion, he kissed it away and she wrapped her arms around his waist, praying wildly.

More than anything she couldn't mess up, more than anything she had to be good.

She had to be.

For everyone else's sake if not her own.

Because….because…

...the memories died down, their chilling echo still clashing through her mind.

He watched the seemingly never ending process and was glad when it ended.

It stole her away from him too much.

He released her wrists knowing she would not run away now, though the hunger still made her want to shriek and howl and kill until it stopped, she would not run again.

It was her promise, her sworn whispers of salvation.

"I love you".

It was a sad declaration, the truest thing he had ever said or felt, and his overwhelming link to her.

His love.

She glanced at him through orbs that were swimming with color, dark and light blue, black and white.

He was not expecting it when she slapped him, hard, his head whipped to one side as her small hand made contact and his cheek stung. He winced and turned around to look down at her stunned.

"I love you too."

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Give an authoress her wings, review. Please, lol. 


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